During assembly of a panelized aircraft fuselage, skin panels may be spliced together. The splicing may include fastening operations synchronously on opposite sides of the skin panels. For instance, drilling and fastener insertion may be performed outside the fuselage, and fastener termination may be performed inside the fuselage. During the assembly of a panelized fuselage of a large commercial aircraft, several hundred thousand fasteners may be inserted and terminated.
Fastener termination is highly labor intensive. Due to a heavy dependence on manual labor, production rates are subject to constant change. Changes in production rates can lengthen production times.
It would be desirable to create a more stable environment for assembling the fuselages of large commercial aircraft.